Michael's Telluride Film Blog : Oscar #96 and Telluride / Interviews and Profiles: Emma Stone, Paul Giamatti and More

OSCAR #96 AND TELLURIDE

TFF films earned 35 nominations for Academy Awards on Tuesday morning. I had predicted 35 total nominations on Monday. Of course, the 35 I predicted weren't exactly the 35 that actually came up.

For example, I had Poor Things listed for 13 and it landed 11. I had the film getting nominated for Best Supporting Actor twice but Willem Dafoe didn't make the cut. I also had it being nominated for Best Visual Effects.

Another example: I had Alexander Payne getting named as one of the five Best Directors. Nope.

But other TFF films over-performed. Anatomy of a Fall, which I predicted for three nominations, scored a Best Direction nomination for Justine Triet and another for Best Editing.

Nyad's Annette Bening's Best Actress nomination was one more than I had predicted.

As I mentioned in Tuesday's Special Oscar Nomination post, I went 91 for 120 on the predictions. That's a rate of 75.8% which is a couple of points below my five year average. Still, checking on the predictions from the experts that participate in Gold Derby's poll, I would have been 6th among the 28 referenced there bettering participants from Variety, Deadline, Awards Daily and Gold Derby itself.

My best categories, where I named all the nominees in a category, were Best Picture (10/10), Best Actor, Best Original Screenplay and Best Costumes (all 5/5).

More worst category: Best Documentary Feature where I got just two out of the five.

In the "close but no cigar" predictions, there were six categories wherein the film I had listed as first alternate made the nomination lineup: Jonathan Glazer for Direction, Annette Bening for Actress, The Eternal Memory for Doc Feature, Anatomy of a Fall for Editing, Society of the Snow for Makeup/Hair and Knight of Fortune for Live Action Short.

Now it's on to predicting the actual Oscar winners which will be announced on March 10th. The early thinking is that Oppenheimer is going to have a big night and could approach an Oscar haul approaching Slumdog Millionaire's (eight Oscars) from 2009. It is certainly the frontrunner for Best Picture. It's biggest challenge probably is from Poor Things or The Holdovers.

Actually, had The Holdovers picked nominations for Direction and Supporting Actor, I might think it had a fighting chance at the Green Book/CODA-like upset. Absent those noms, though...probably not.

My first completely intuitive picks for Oscar night have the wins going like this:

Oppenheimer: Picture, Direction, Supporting Actor, Adapted Screenplay, Cinematography, Editing, Score and Sound for a total of eight. It could be more as Cillian Murphy is a viable possibility for Best Actor.

The Holdovers: Actor, Supporting Actress and Original Screenplay.

Barbie: Song, Production Design and Costumes.

Poor Things: Actress. It's also very competitive for Production Design, Costumes, Makeup/Hair.

Single wins for:

The Zone of Interest: International Feature

20 Days in Mariupol: Documentary Feature

Spiderman: Across the Spider-Verse: Animated Feature

The Creator: Visual Effects

Maestro: Makeup/Hair

Letter to a Pig: Animated Short

The Wonderful Life of Henry Sugar: Live Action Short

The Last Repair Shop: Documentary Short.

If I'm right, TFF films will emerge with six trophies on Oscar night but will, once again, not have screened the Best Picture Oscar winner. The last TFF film to win Best Picture was Parasite in 2020.

At first blush, I have Killers of the Flower Moon not winning any Oscar, although Lily Gladstone is very, very viable to beat Emma Stone for Best Actress. Does KOTFM avoid the fate of Scorsese's The Irishman which was also nominated for 10 Oscars and left the 2020 Oscars empty-handed?

I'll have my first "real" predictions for Oscar winners on Monday beginning with Best Picture, Direction and the Lead Acting categories.

INTERVIEWS AND PROFILES